The Ultimate Adam

 In This is My Body: A Call to Eucharistic Revival, Bishop Robert Baron writes:

We are meant to notice a contrast between the figure mentioned at the outset of [Luke's infancy] narrative -- Caesar Augustus -- and the character who is at the center of the story. Caesar would have been the best-fed person in the world, able at a snap of his fingers to have all of his sensual desires met. But the true king, the true emperor of the world, is born in a cave outside of a forgotten town on the verge of Caesar's domain.

Caesar, we might say, represents the best possible outcome of the fall of Adam, the closest to a god that man can get on his own. And it's precisely at this moment in time, when God's chosen people are living the kind of life you get when there's someone who is the closest to a god that man can get on his own, that God gets the closest to man that God can get.

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The Mystery of Suffering

 In one of her letters, St. Catherine of Siena said -- well, she said basically the same thing in more than one letter, but I'm quoting Letter T5/G225 to Francesco da Montalcino:

And whatever [God] gives or permits us, whether pain or illness, in whatever way, he gives and permits it with great mystery, to make us holy and to give us what we need to be saved.

The translator, Suzanne Noffke, OP, adds this note after the word "mystery":

This is the concept of "mystery" (mistero) which is so dear to Catherine, always carrying a sense of the sacramental, of the intimate interaction of God with humanity.

Of course "mystery" and "sacrament" are two different terms for the same thing:

The Greek word mysterion was translated into Latin by two terms: mysterium and sacramentum. In later usage the term sacramentum emphasizes the visible sign of the hidden reality of salvation which was indicated by the term mysterium. In this sense, Christ himself is the mystery of salvation: "For there is no other mystery of God, except Christ." The saving work of his holy and sanctifying humanity is the sacrament of salvation, which is revealed and active in the Church's sacraments (which the Eastern Churches also call "the holy mysteries"). The seven sacraments are the signs and instruments by which the Holy Spirit spreads the grace of Christ the head throughout the Church which is his Body. The Church, then, both contains and communicates the invisible grace she signifies. It is in this analogical sense, that the Church is called a "sacrament." - CCC 774

 I don't think there's a sense analogical enough for me call pain or illness a "sacrament." But if pain or illness is something physical in which I find God present, and in that experience He gives me what I need to be saved....

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A Very Certain Pharisee

A certain Pharisee invited Jesus to dine with him, and he entered the Pharisee’s house and reclined at table.

Now there was a sinful woman in the city who learned that he was at table in the house of the Pharisee. Bringing an alabaster flask of ointment, she stood behind him at his feet weeping and began to bathe his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them, and anointed them with the ointment.

When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would know who and what sort of woman this is who is touching him, that she is a sinner.”

Isn't that last bit strange? A sinful woman crashes a Pharisee's party, then cries, wipes, kisses, and anoints all over the feet of his out-of-town guest, and what does the Pharisee say to himself?

"Now here's something you don't see every day."? No.

"Note to self: In future, prevent guests from being assaulted by notorious sinners."? No.

"What the heck is she doing?"? No.

All he manages is, "She's a sinner, so he's no prophet."

That's heavy duty interpretive bias. That's some kind of certainty about what's happening, even though what's happening is surely nothing he has ever seen before.

In Simon the Pharisee's mind, this sinful woman is securely categorized as "sinner," and nothing and nobody is going to earn her a reconsideration. He looks at her and sees nothing but SINNER. He doesn't see her penitence. He doesn't see her adoration. In fact, that SINNER is so strong it blinds him to everything it touches, including Simon's guest. (Though apparently Simon's house, to say nothing of himself, remains pure.)

St. Luke doesn't tell us how Simon responded to Jesus' rebuke, so we might hope that he himself wound up penitent and adoring. As we might hope for ourselves, if and when we happen to be too certain of our own righteousness and the sinfulness of another.

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On an unrelated note

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What price the Kingdom?

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Free gifts!

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The Christian Two-Step

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To You I have entrusted my cause

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Where was I?

Fr. Clement Burns, OP, preaches something he calls "the Broadway Prayer," for use when a person or situation in your life weighs heavily on your heart.

The steps of the Broadway Prayer are:

1. Thank God for the person. Put his name up in lights (hence "Broadway") and celebrate the good that God has placed in him. It doesn't matter whether you feel particularly thankful. "Dear God, thank you for my neighbor. Thank you for the love she has for your creation [which she shows by keeping two dozen cats]. Thank you for her enthusiasm [which keeps her up till 2 a.m. on weekends] and her sense of humor [marked by that braying laugh]."
2. Ask God to change the person in some observable way. Of course, the way you think the person should change may not be the way God thinks he should. You just pray for what you think is best, and leave the rest to God. The important point, for this prayer, is that the change be something you will be able to detect. "I pray that my mother may stop spitting tobacco juice on the rugs and shooting at squirrels from my porch."
3. Thank God for changing the person. Take a moment to imagine the person changed in the way you have asked, then thank God for it. "Thank you, Lord, for helping him to stop insulting Norwegians in my presence."

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